He will improve DDG was piss poor when he first came over
Kepa Arrizabalaga
- Thread starter charlenefan
- Start date
-
In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
No he was't. He made a mistake in community shield and then vs West Brom, after that he was very good shot stopper with mistakes now and then. Overall he was miles better than Kepa and he was 21 when he joined.
From the replays, it looks like he actually got a firm hand on the ball. I don't know much about keeping but I'd expect my keeper to do a better job of guiding it from goal once he's gotten a firm hand on the ball.
Kepa will only improve. He's a good keeper. The price tag isnt his fault, its how Bilbao operate.
He's not special at all. The constant comparisons to DDG isn't doing him any favors as well.
Yeah he will improve, I just disagreed with De Gea part.
De Gea would likely have kept Pogba's header out but not many others in the league would have. He is a decent keeper who needs to grow in stature but he's never an 80m player or on De Gea's level, even the De Gea we got from Atletico.
If this guy cost £70m and DDG's new contract will (apparently) cost £90m, then quite frankly DDG's contract is a bargain.
Not all players that start off piss poor end up good enough to play for a CL club, long term. In fact, most players that start off piss poor don’t end up good enough to play for a CL club, long term.
Hasn't done anything wrong yesterday. He is the least of our issues! Main issue on Pogba goal was firstly letting the cross come in, and secondly allowing Pogba to get a run at it to get that much power cleanly on the header. Wouldn't expect any keeper to save that header down low with that much power from about 3 yards away. Ball pretty much hits his hand and deflects in, no chance to save it.
De Gea didn't cost 70m.
It's madness that people actually think De Gea was that bad when he joined. Fantastic work by the media there.
Alan Hansen.
No he wasnt
De Gea being 'piss poor' when he first came here 
The only thing bad about De Gea when he first came was his handling of crosses (dead ball and open play) and that's still a weakness of his.
I swear some people instead of looking at qualities, they just 'rate' players and assume everyone is the same when they are 'rated'. De Gea never had shot stopping weaknesses, he didn't turn into a shot stopping god by getting used to the league, he was making ridiculous saves in his first season.
Pogba made the header outside the keepers area, and comfortably outside at that. It looked mid-way between the penalty spot and keepers area.
Look at Kepa's reaction, how he had his head down after it went in. He knew could have saved it because it was nowhere near the corner and a save-able height. Face it, he has flappy hands when diving down, it's happened several times this season.
The only thing bad about De Gea when he first came was his handling of crosses (dead ball and open play) and that's still a weakness of his.
I swear some people instead of looking at qualities, they just 'rate' players and assume everyone is the same when they are 'rated'. De Gea never had shot stopping weaknesses, he didn't turn into a shot stopping god by getting used to the league, he was making ridiculous saves in his first season.
3 yards away
Pogba made the header outside the keepers area, and comfortably outside at that. It looked mid-way between the penalty spot and keepers area.
Look at Kepa's reaction, how he had his head down after it went in. He knew could have saved it because it was nowhere near the corner and a save-able height. Face it, he has flappy hands when diving down, it's happened several times this season.
As someone who watched every Atletico game prior to us signing him, He was actually a good GK but just lacked presence. That was something that got exposed early in his first season with us.
Kepa hasn’t been that bad either.
De Gea was a bit dodgy in his first season. Let’s not rewrite history here.
If you watch the Pogba goal from behind you can see whilst Kepa gets his hand to it the power generated makes it very difficult to save, not impossible but can't blame him, not a GK mistake. Main issues for the goal are with the defence, and with the team generally the midfield. We are woeful at the moment but Kepa is least of the problem!
Also of course De Gea has shot stopping weaknesses such as this from last summer:
Also of course De Gea has shot stopping weaknesses such as this from last summer:
Yeah? He was a bit dodgy, he certainly wasn't piss poor. The media made it a huge narrative after his first few games. Hell they tried to spin Andy Carroll elbowing him at full speed into De Gea being bad.
Why are people giving him a pass for Pogba's header? He's fecking supposed to save that. Ball wasn't far away from him, he could touch it. His hand was simply way too weak there.
He's not bad, but he's far from the goalkeeping greats the PL has had over the last 10 years. You'd expect a hell of a lot more for the money spent.
Think you might have, because shot stopping was not the issue. It was physicality and corners. This guy is very, very weak.
He did save it. Then he pushed it into his own net, fecking woeful really.
Goalkeeping howler = weakness???
Kepa is flapping at shots every few games. He has a chronic problem. It's textbook deflection to talk about other players when someone you champion is making mistakes. Were you in here talking bollocks about that Gundogan goal as well? Some Chelsea fans were talking as if it was a wonder strike when it is a save any good keeper makes.
This reminds me of Pool fans swearing up and down that Karius was a great keeper that only made a mistake because of the concussion, when he was making fundamental errors as far back as January.
I see this myth has stuck. De Gea made one mistake when he dropped a cross and SAF dropped him to help his confidence. Which set the narrative in stone.
Dave was never consistently piss poor.
Last edited:
He isn't worth 80 mil atm. Very mistake-prone.
Literally every goalkeeper lets goals in like that now and again. People trying to paint him as a “fraud” for letting in the sort of goal that we’ve seen De Gea concede many times is ridiculous.
Yeah, he dropped a clanger with Dzeko’s speculative effort in the CS game, but in the same match made a godly close range save at 2-2. Then he made a similar mistake against Shane Long vs West Brom but saves a peno against RvP next match.
Opponents peppering De Gea with long range efforts was a thing that season as a result, but aside from the initial mistakes he handled them well. After claiming his place back after Lindegaard’s horror show at OT in the Reading 4-3 match, he was the best GK in the league second half that season, capped by the magical Mata FK save in 3-3 Chelsea away. The narrative that he was ‘piss poor’ was just a myth perpetrated by the media, pure and simple. The next season they tried the same shit when he made a singular high profile mistake against Spurs, but were great the whole season and eventually voted in PFA team of the year ahead of Joe ‘Lionheart’ Hart.
Last edited:
Why do people still talk about transfer fees as if there’s some objective logic to them. We’d all be so much better off if we just accepted that it’s all abitrary and meaningless.
He's the least of their problems right now, but I don't understand this recent obsession with keepers who are good with their feet. It's nice to have, sure, but surely there are more important attributes to look for in a keeper?
I’m in the ‘should have saved Pogba’s header’ camp as well.
Well, maybe it’s not one you’d expect a goalkeeper to save - it is a bullet of a header - but if you do manage to get a hand to it like he did you’d have to hope it would be a strong one. That’s his only crime there I’d say.
Well, maybe it’s not one you’d expect a goalkeeper to save - it is a bullet of a header - but if you do manage to get a hand to it like he did you’d have to hope it would be a strong one. That’s his only crime there I’d say.
I think he will come good but I'm still of the opinion if you get a good hand to the ball, you should save it.
What constant comparisons? Not one Chelsea fan has ever compared him favourably and apart from the debate about the Spanish team selection i have never even seen them been mentioned in the same breath.
Let's be honest here, he has signed for the club the media hate the most for a record breaking fee, if he's been as bad as you're trying to portray the media would have targeted him months ago and he would be walking meme on social media. Upto about this time last month he was on 15 clean sheets in 27 games which is hugely impressive for your first half season and figures that would be deemed impressive even for prime Cech (not saying he is or ever will be that level).
Could he have done better with a few goals? Yes, Is he worth £70m? No but overall i have been happy with him and i feel he will only improve for here on. I would list all the games he has won us points but i can't really be arsed.
He's the best shot stopper in the world. Bit of a reach to say he has weaknesses. Just a howler which all keepers have.
The first half of that season was just lunacy from the media. They were dead certain that he was garbage and couldn't catch a cold. Harry Redknapp's masterclass tactic against him was to have Van der Vaart take potshots from 40 yards. Genius.
We won 3-0 that night. Even Anderson scored. Anderson!
Must be weird for the 'journalists' who slated him weekly in 2011/12 spending the last few years banging on about how we'd be midtable without him.
David was 18 and already a great shot stopper. People forget that David wasn't exactly trash he just mostly failed during set pieces where he got bullied by the likes of crouch, Carroll. He adapted to the physicality of set pieces in England. I haven't seen any outstanding attributes from Kepa.
He only cost that much because it's Bilbao and Chelsea had to panic buy after Courtois forced his way out. I'm sure if it was up to them he'd still be their GK.
That Spurs match was hilarious, they took two or three long shots in the first few minutes and they were going on about how great Harry was to spot and exploit our weakness. De Gea had such a handy game.
If you think De Gea never let in a shot he should have saved in his first few years at United then you're a fecking lunatic. Hell he was getting beat easily at his near post earlier this season.
And that was just the top google search.